EDUCATION

INTERNATIONAL
STORIES

Catholic
Church

Pope asks Protestants
for forgiveness for persecution(Sydney Morning Herald) Jan 26 - Rome: Pope Francis asked Protestants and other Christian Churches for
forgiveness for past persecution by Catholics as the Vatican announced on
Monday he would visit Sweden this year to mark the 500th anniversary of the
Reformation.

Also:
Rights groups rap treatment
of Indonesian sect members (Yahoo
7 News) Jan 31 - Jakarta (AFP) - Indonesia has relocated more than 1,500 members of a
controversial sect from their village "for their own safety", an
official said Wednesday, but rights groups described their treatment as
religious persecution.

Also:
Islamic State supporters
in Malaysia pledge revenge for arrests(Sydney Morning Herald) Jan 25 - Bangkok: The south-east Asian wing of Islamic State has threatened
revenge for the arrests of a growing number of its militants in Malaysia,
prompting a further tightening of security in the Muslim-majority nation.

Iowa's evangelicals take
spotlight in presidential raceYahoo
7 News Jan 31 - Fenton, Iowa (United States) (AFP) - That Ted Cruz, Republican
candidate for US president, should have taken the trouble to travel to tiny
Fenton, with its 263 inhabitants and two churches, speaks volumes about the
evangelical vote -- particularly in Iowa, where the presidential primary
process begins Monday.

Syria returnee Mehmet Biber
warns of homegrown attacks(Sydney Morning Herald) Jan 31 - A Sydney man who has returned from the battlefield in Syria has warned
of more attacks like the murder of police accountant Curtis Cheng and says he
would voluntarily leave again if the government handed his passport back.

Also:
Inside the Alliance
Defending Freedom, the 'gay-hate' group hosting Tony Abbott(Sydney Morning Herald) Jan 26 - The Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative religious group that
Tony Abbott is to address in the United States this week, has become prominent
in the religious right movement for its work seeking to criminalise sodomy
internationally and roll back anti-discrimination laws in America.

Also:
Tony Abbott and the
right to dissent from the new morality (ABC The Drum) Jan 31 – (Opinion: Michael Jensen) Ironically, the reaction to Tony Abbott's
decision to speak to the Alliance Defending Freedom proves that group right
when it claims that our religious freedoms are under threat as never before

Time for Australia to
ban Taliban terrorists (The Age,
Melbourne) Jan 29 – (Opinion: William Maley and David Savage) On January 20, 2016, a
suicide bomber on a motorcycle struck at a bus in the Afghan capital Kabul,
killing seven passengers and wounding more than 20 other people.